My friend Brian was telling me about a laughable, but frustrating, conversation he had with his Gen Z daughter. Brian was driving his daughter and several of her friends home from a tryout for an elite travel team.
A lot of quality players participated in the tryout. Making this team was a big deal to his daughter and her friends. They had worked hard to ready themselves for the occasion.
And although Brian sensed the girls in his car were feeling a sense of relief that the tryout was over, he also sensed they were feeling stress over having to wait until the next day to find out if they made the team.
He wanted to say something reassuring that would put them at ease with the effort that had put forth. He wanted them to realize that they had controlled what they could, and therefore shouldn’t waste any energy worrying about what they couldn’t.
“Well, did you leave anything on the table?” Brian asked.
Crickets. No one responded.
Brian was becoming worried that maybe his daughter had held something back and not given her best effort at the tryout.
Finally, one of the girls spoke up. “What do you mean by ‘leave anything on the table’?” she said.
“Yeah, what table?” another said.
“You don’t know that expression?” Brian asked. “It means you didn’t hold anything back. You gave it your best.”
“Oh, you mean like ate and left no crumbs?” his daughter said.
Ate and left no crumbs? Brian wasn’t familiar with this particular Gen Z expression. But based on the context, he figured he knew what she meant. Before he could say anything else, however, another girl chimed in.
“We definitely slayed,” she said.
“Slayed?” Brian said.
“Yeah, slayed. You know, slayed,” his daughter explained.
Brian thought to himself: It’s always so nice when someone defines a word with which you are unfamiliar by using that same word in their definition.
The conversation had gone off course and was becoming exhausting. He could tell by the look on his daughter’s face that he was starting to be cringe (He was already familiar with that one!), so he backed off.
When Brian got back home, he was still thinking about the car ride. Brian decided to Google the expressions his daughter and her friends had used earlier to see if he could familiarize himself with any other Gen Z jargon.
To his surprise, “ate and left no crumbs” did not equate to mean what he thought it did. “Ate and left no crumbs” turned out to be synonymous with awesome, amazing, or incredible.
This wasn’t the message he was trying to convey. He wasn’t trying to get them to acknowledge that they had done awesome, amazing, or incredible. He was trying to get them to acknowledge that they had exhausted their efforts by giving the tryout everything they had.
Brian’s story offers an interesting insight regarding good teammates: They’re exhaustive, but never exhausting.
Good teammates exhaust their enthusiasm, kindness, compassion, and gratitude. They don’t hold anything back. They use it all.
Yet good teammates are hyper-aware of how what they are doing affects those around them. They aren’t petty, shallow, or annoying. They don’t allow their idiosyncrasies to wear others out. They don’t allow themselves to become emotionally exhausting to others.
Committing to being exhaustive and refusing to be exhausting keeps good teammates from being cringe. And it helps their teams slay. (If you don’t understand, ask a Gen Z to explain. Or IYKYN!)
As always…Good teammates care. Good teammates share. Good teammates listen. Go be a good teammate.
